Mary+Lynn+Mason

====Definition: Second Life: Second Life is a virtual website that is available to educators as a teaching tool. Second life has many facets; one of them is Picture of the day. ====

Explanation: Picture of the Day could be useful for an English Language Arts teacher. Students would be required to look up Picture of the Day on the Second Life website and write about what they see or what they perceive the picture to mean. The teacher may choose to ask the students to write about one or two objects within the picture; and how they interpret the artist's thought while creating the piece of art work. This could also be useful for an art teacher to use with his or her students.

Another aspect of Second Life is that is mostly depicted via anime. Anime, at least at this time, is something most young people are familiar with and enjoy; therefore. it may be able to keep the attention of the students. It may be a good place for a teacher to start a series of lessons which the students are required to complete a final project in anime or other cartoon style.

Second Life is not favorable to all educators; educators that have tried the Second Life method, are working to assess "the potential for the barriers to deploying virtual world's in learning and teaching." (Warburton)

Links: British Journal of Educational Technology,Volume 40, Issue 3 May 2009 414-426 Steve Warburton, Wiley Online Education/doi/10.1111/j.1467-8535.2009.00952 Taylor and Francis Online. Using Virtual Worlds In Education: Second Life as an Education. Suzanne C. Baker,et al, Teaching of Psychology, Volume 36, Issue 1, 2009